


Mine

by PencilofAwesomeness



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Drabble, First Meetings, Gen, Reflection, this just kinda happened
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-31
Updated: 2017-07-31
Packaged: 2018-12-09 03:33:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11660772
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PencilofAwesomeness/pseuds/PencilofAwesomeness
Summary: The Black Lion awakens from ten thousand years of isolation, with a stranger in the black paladin armor at her feet. But she already has a paladin. The question is, which one is worth keeping?Takes place during the pilot episode.





	Mine

**Author's Note:**

> I recently rewatched the pilot with my friend, whom I successfully got into the show. (Yay!) I noticed that when they awakened the Black Lion, that Allura appeared quite nervous, almost like the Black Lion may reject Shiro as a potential paladin. Which considering that Zarkon still has something of a bond with her later... I don't know. This kinda just happened. It's nothing fancy, but I wanted to do it, and I had fun.
> 
> Enjoy!

The Black Lion had been alone for millennia. Time was hard to track, especially for a being that transcends it, but it had been long enough to feel like an eternity.

The isolation had only been mitigated by the confusion the Black Lion felt. It remembered its paladin—and it remembered as its paladin began to sink farther away, closer to darkness that made the head of Voltron uncomfortable. It was on this that the Black Lion was left to reflect on for all those years.

Zarkon had been distracted; that much was obvious. But the lion knew there had been something brewing in the paladin’s soul, something that the lion wished to protect him from. The other paladins sensed this too. It was fear, perhaps, that caused the other paladins to lock to the Black Lion away. They did not understand the bond between the Black Paladin and lion, and they were not sure if the Black Lion’s own essence was enough to guard against the darkness that had gripped its paladin. It was understandable, but it hurt. To be away from the rest of Voltron for so long… The lions were meant to be one unit; they were never meant to be permanently separated.

Though Voltron had been divided long before they locked the Black Lion away. The Red Paladin faded away, into oblivion, and her lion walked the edge ever since. They had not lost one of their own before; the vivid absence was startling and unsettling, a gaping hole in the universe’s defender. From the hole, fell the rest of the paladins—including its own. The Black Lion could not pretend to understand what its paladin felt, but through their bond, it could feel Zarkon’s anguish and _anger_ vicariously, enough to overload the senses.

The lions of Voltron were never made to be able to feel, but somewhere along the way, they came to. With a soul truly more ancient than what they were, the lions could feel what their paladins did. And in the face of tragedy, it was nearly too much.

It distracted them; in that lapse of attention, the ties that held Voltron together—the bond between paladins—frayed and loosened. Although, in its time of reflection, the Black Lion realizes that the inevitable tension and fracture in the bond was never contingent on the lions—just the paladins. It was doomed to fall apart, ever since they lost one of their own. The Black Lion just wished, futilely, that it hadn’t gone down so destructively—that it wasn’t its own paladin that lost his mind.

The lion feels the loss of its paladin’s sanity acutely, even before it was locked away; now, it just feels loss. It isn’t sure if its paladin will ever come back to it, nor if it should.

By the end of the Black Lion’s time of isolation, it is content with having no paladin. It failed Zarkon, in his time of need, and that could not be forgiven.

The Black Lion never imagined—not with its limited ability to think—that a paladin should come to its very foot.

The presence of the other lions cut through the emptiness like a wash of warmth. Suddenly, they are Whole again. It brings the Black Lion out to the physical plain once more, settled in its great body. The hangar doors open, the four limbs of Voltron stationed outside the chamber like horsemen.

The man is in the middle, in the Black Paladin armor. He is small, and young, and foreign. The Black Lion peers down at it, into his very essence, as he regards the Black Lion like a queen on her throne. He sees the lion for what it is, and what it could be, and he is in awe of her presence. The thought is both gratifying and flattering, and she accepts it.

He, upon further inspection, is interesting. The human—for that is what he was, she discovered—was inexperienced and without knowledge of what she truly was, but he believed in what she could be. There was a spirit in him, one of noble justice and fierce determination, that bubbled up without bounds. For one so young, for a species that appeared so fragile, it was startling the potential he had.

The man was loyal and honest. He cared already for the other paladins—ones her sisters had chosen. She could see that he would protect them without hesitation, listen to them, and fight for them. The princess—Alfor’s daughter—was here, somewhere, as well, and he would defer to her. He placed his respect where it was due; a true leader knew when to trust.

She delves into his mind, only to find it a mess. There are parts—glimpses, really—that she isn’t even sure the human can access. They were filled with pain, and darkness.

This human had met Zarkon, her paladin.

And Zarkon had done terrible things to this man in return.

Why would he come to her, when her paladin had hurt him so? It was either ignorance, or bravery, or blind faith. With his mind a jumble, it is hard to tell. But she sees his soul, and it is strong. She had never encountered a human before, but based on this man, and what her sisters say of their own human paladins, the Black Lion sees just what they are capable of.

Their essence is not potent like an Altean’s, or stalwart like a Galran’s, but it is adaptable, and it is creative. Should they form Voltron, they would make it a force to be reckoned with.

But that means the Black Lion would have to accept a new paladin.

She feels protective of what little remains of her bond with Zarkon, because it’s _hers._ But if what she sees in this human is true—and if what she remembers from millennia has further decayed still—then it might not be worth keeping. Voltron is a protector, not a destroyer. The Black Lion will maintain this as long as she stands, because it feels _important_ that she must do so. She has seen Darkness, and she never wishes to embrace it.

Zarkon may have done so already.

The deeds he has done angers her, in a way she has not been angered since the Red Paladin was taken away from them. If that is what he wants to be, then the Black Lion can no longer accept him.

But the universe needs Voltron. And the more she peers at the man before her, the more the Black Lion grows fond of his resolve.

Shiro may be young, and he wasn’t what she lost, but she would make him _hers._

The Black Lion roars, invoking the full bond of Voltron as the Black Paladin shifts into place, a piece connected through her to a larger picture.

Voltron had returned.


End file.
